Tuesday, February 21, 2017

Property over people

The RTA’s full plan calls for the new terminal to become a hub for
development near Canal Street, with proposals to rework the Riverfront
and Canal streetcar lines to connect through the site and tie in with
the proposed World Trade Center redevelopment and work being done by the
Ernest N. Morial Convention Center a few blocks upriver.

Under
the redesign, the terminal would no longer present a barrier between
Woldenberg Riverfront Park and the Aquarium of the Americas on one side
of Canal Street and Spanish Plaza and the Riverwalk mall on the other.

Officials hope to have the work completed by early 2018.

Presently,
the two big issues for opponents are the lack of an overhang for
passengers boarding and exiting the ferry, and the lack of a passenger
bridge over the nearby railroad tracks.

Expecting passengers to
board without any protection for the weather is inconvenient and
hazardous, critics say, especially if they are running across the tracks
and on a rain-slicked platform to catch an arriving ferry.

And
without a bridge, passengers would wait up to 15 minutes for a train to
pass before they could board or leave a ferry, they said.

But
Justin Augustine III, vice president of Transdev, the French
transportation conglomerate that runs RTA’s operations, said there is
little money for much of what residents want.